The JVM is a rich, mature platform, and you get so much for free by designing new languages on top of it. The point of debate is: what are the costs, and are they always worth the asking price?

The main argument presented is that JVM-based languages, while having access to all of Java's facilities and features, may have too high a penalty to pay in terms of start up time and the user's perceived latency.
Scripted languages that target the JVM are becoming mainstream in server-side, enterprise applications. Should enterprise developers tie the choice of a scripting language to the JVM, or should these decisions be independent of one another? What are your experiences with JVM-hosted languages and their use for non-server specific development?

I've written a few command line tools in Java e.g. a regex tool and the startup time for the VM is usually undetectable. The only time it becomes an issue is when I want to execute the application many times in a loop.

Before we start getting in JVM is good vs bad flame wars, the title is a bit misleading.
The author specifically talks about costs vs benefits in environments where small memory footprints and low start times are desired such as in embedded devices.
On desktops it obviously depends on the app. If you're launching apps like Photoshop, JVM or not its negligible.
JVM/, like any other things, is not a silver bullet. Repeat that and perhaps we can get some more meaningful topics to discuss.

I went to a talk last week about Java 7 and one of the main issues Sun is going to address in this release is startup time, in order to bring it down to about the same times as interpreted languages like Python... it was great to see that Sun listens to the concerns of the community!

I went to a talk last week about Java 7 and one of the main issues Sun is going to address in this release is startup time, in order to bring it down to about the same times as interpreted languages like Python... it was great to see that Sun listens to the concerns of the community!

Can anybody think of any reason why Java startup time should be any slower than something like Python?

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